Memories Of Nobody
by ForbiddenKHfan216
Summary: The memories of the Nobodies of Kingdom Hearts II and 358/2 Days; how they might have became Nobodies in the first place and how their Others might have acted when their Hearts were taken.
1. The Lonely Girl: Naminé

**Okay, I've been a little depressed lately.**

**That's why I haven't been writing as much as I used to... and so when I finally put my fingers onto the keyboard, this came out.**

**I have no idea if I'll continue this and do a chapter for each of the Organization members but it made me feel a little better.**

**Disclaimers (Cause I gotta put them): Kingdom Hearts and Naminé herself belong to Square Enix/Disney and as far as I know, I am not a member of either one.**

**I hope someone reads this... You know, cause it's my ramblings on how I think Naminé was found. **

**For you slow guys, YES, this chapter is about Naminé!**

**This is what I figured being a Nobody must have been like for her... or at least how it was in the beginning.**

**Cause they never really explain that bit... I didn't even know that she had been found in C.O. to begin with!**

**And before I go into a rant, I hope you enjoy, whoever's reading! **

**Note: I totally took a few liberties with this to make it flow a little better.**

* * *

_When I became a Nobody, I was all by myself._

_Even the Organization members had each other, even if they hated (as much as a Nobody can hate someone, at least) other._

_I was one of the so called "special" Nobodies…. For my skill in remaking other people's memories of those who loved them and changing those chains of recollection into whatever shape, form, and idea that I wanted._

_I never asked for that talent and I never wanted to be a bad person._

_But somehow I ended up doing just that; destroying the memories of not only one person I would grow to care about, but two and becoming someone I knew had done something horrible._

_Roxas… who's only crime was that he wanted to be human and to stay with the only friends he had forever. _

_I took that from him._

_Sora…. Who's only fault was that he cares about his friends._

_I made it nearly impossible for him to return to those friends for such a long time._

_I felt so guilty about these deeds. As much as a Nobody like me can feel guilt. _

_And yet… I didn't regret it. Not even the slightest bit._

_One memory of my own stood out when I managed to leave that Castle behind and move Sora to somewhere "safe"._

_The memory was recalling how I had become a Nobody in the first place and the blurred first days of being alone and of living in that Castle that would later become my prison._

* * *

A flash of pain resonates through the girl's chest as she tumbles to the ground, gripping an unknown someone's hand as tightly as she could, even as the connection between them shattered, sending them flying into opposite ends of a long and dark corridor.

The boy reached for her with a ringed hand even as she fell deeper and deeper into her end, his dull blue eyes widening in mock emotion as he began to disappear so far away from her.

She reached for him too, even as he vanished in front of her own dull blue eyes. Then she was alone.

The girl didn't know what had happened or even who the blonde boy had been.

She knew that he looked a little familiar, but not from the way he looked.

As she tumbles deeper and deeper into the darkness in which she found herself, she noticed another shape in the corridor.

A little black shadowy creature that stared at her in what seemed like confusion as she began to fall a little more slowly.

Something inside her begged for her to reach out to the little creature; it seemed just as lost and alone as she and the boy were.

In almost perfect unison, she and the Heartless touched palms together and a chainlike structure appeared in their joined hands.

The girl could only stare at the sparkling links that glimmered with a faint light and she suddenly knew that it was a memory.

Whose memory it was seemed unclear; it wasn't the creature's and it wasn't the girl's. It belonged to someone different entirely.

As it began to remember, the creature cries out in what sounded like pain and lets go of the girl's hand just as it began to shift back into its true state.

As for the girl, she continues to fall.

* * *

Down…. Down…. Down…. As she tumbles farther into the darkness, she places her hand on her quivering chest as water seemed to well up from behind her eyelids for no reason.

The girl didn't know that they were tears.

She didn't know that she was sad and alone.

She only knew the darkness and the emptiness inside her as she fell.

* * *

When she stopped falling, she didn't know.

When she opened those glassy sapphire eyes again, she was somewhere different from the corridor made of darkness.

She looks around the strange place, wondering vaguely where she was.

All she could feel was the soft texture of the yellowish green things below her and how soothingly the blades of whatever it was blew in the faint breeze.

Closing her eyes, she smell the sweet scent of the drying grass struggling to grow beneath her hands.

She shifts slightly in her comfortable spot, adjusting her trembling body to the faint rays of the sun, so different from the harshness of the tunnel she had just been through.

"He…" The noise emerges from her lips before she could stop it.

She opens her eyes and places a slim finger on her lips to quiet herself.

Her face suddenly contorts and the corners of her lips raise themselves into a serene and quietly happy smile.

She furrows her brow, not sure how she knew what a smile was if she had never done it before.

"He-Hello." The girl whispers to the shining sun she believed was above her, feeling the water from that place behind her eyelids begin to fall again as she stares up into the churning charcoal sky above her.

The memory of chiming bells resonate through the girl's mind as she stands shakily to her feet.

She places her pale hands to her chest, right where she could almost feel the ghost of a beating pulse from somewhere inside her.

The salty water falls down from her eyes as she begins to walk away the closed doors at the end of the courtyard she had fallen into and down the path she had found.

The girl had quickly noticed how empty this Castle was.

She herself seemed to be the only thing alive out here except for maybe for plants and even they seemed like they were dying.

It was lonely but she didn't know that.

As she walked, the girl realized that sound didn't seem to carry normally in the castle; even as she shouted loudly into the darkness, the sound seemed to be engulfed in that same darkness and no echo was heard.

"Hello? Is someone here?" The girl cries out, wondering if it was possible that she really was alone here.

She shakes herself and firmly tells herself "No."

It seemed impossible that she could be the only one person in the entire world. There had to be someone else. Someone who could help.

"Help do what?" The girl questions herself as she realizes that she was looking for something.

She had the strangest feeling that she had lost something, something important. Something so important that it was of the utmost importance that she find it as soon as she could.

This was the point where she started to run, shouting for someone to hear her, calling for the fuzzy images that were slipping from reach so quickly even as she struggled to hang on to them.

The girl runs down the path, almost in hysterics from yelling out to the darkness and with tears in her dark eyes.

Time passes but she continues to run, searching, calling in the hazy grayness that surrounded the Castle.

* * *

When the girl finally had staggered her way up the sloping path to the castle door, she felt a tight compressing feeling in her chest as she struggled to breathe.

She stumbles awkwardly into the courtyard-like area she had found herself in when she had awakened and gasps for breathe as she tumbles to a dirt covered stop. After she had fallen, she leans against a wall as she slowly recovers from her run.

This time, water drips down from her forehead; it reeked of salt and the girl shudders as her sweat soaked dress begins to dry off in the cooling breeze of evening.

She looks around the darkening courtyard and wonders if she could somehow get inside the warm looking building.

"Please let me in." The girl begs the building as she stands up and takes a few unsure steps towards the closed door.

In an instant, the double doors begin to open, allowing her entrance.

She cries out in joy as she stumbles towards the opening and for shelter.

"It's so quiet… And it's a sad kind of quiet, too." The girl murmurs as she enters, shivering violently in the mild cold.

After all, she only had a thin summer dress and sandals on.

She rubs her bare arms with her icy hands in an attempt to warm them.

"Thank you… for letting me in." She says to the castle, wondering why it had opened up to her so suddenly.

She runs a slender hand against a smooth stone wall, the stone whispering the long ago memories of someone else to her, telling her the castle's past joy.

She hears the memories calling to her but she didn't understand whose memories they were.

It seemed to be the combination of three or more people who were no longer there; it felt painful for the castle to connect their thoughts long after they were gone, chaining the past inhabitants of the castle together so they would never be forgotten.

And yet, it felt good to listen to the chains of memory and she began to follow them deeper into the castle's walls.

As she walked, she realizes that all the rooms looked pretty much the same; white, forbidding walls with equally as white floors. Each room had a vaguely different object inside, whether it be a collection of white vases or some sort of strange flowery statues or some symbol etched on one of the walls.

The castle allowed her to go wherever she wanted until she came to a locked room and put her hand on the doorknob.

In an instant, something inside her shrieks to leave the room alone until she backs away from the door, suddenly frightened.

"Ah! I'm sorry… I'm sorry…" The girl whispers to the room as she puts a trembling hand on the door.

The choking sensation that she had done something wrong continues as she trails her fingers across the pale marble door, wondering why she was shaking so badly.

"I won't go in. I promise. He can sleep in there for as long as he wants." She vows aloud, not sure why she was speaking to the empty hallway as she continues walking down the corridor.

The door seems to spark with unused energy as she passes farther into the hallway even as the person inside delves farther into his dreams.

* * *

And so, the girl passed her days thusly.

She would awaken in one of the many rooms of the Castle, depending on where she had fallen asleep the previous night, and go outside to look for her missing object.

When she had grown tired of walking up and down the path, calling out for it, she would enter the Castle and search for something to eat and a new room to sleep in for the night.

A few days after she had arrived, she thankfully discovered the long abandoned kitchen and this made her food seeking that much easier.

After eating whatever she managed to find for that day, she would go past that same forbidding door and wish whoever was inside a good sleep.

She didn't know why; she just believed that the person sleeping in the room was a kind person who was allowing her to stay in his home and therefore, she should show some respect.

Then she would go to the room she had chosen for the night and curl up in a corner with a piece of moth-eaten curtain as a blanket.

It was a simple existence, nothing much happened as she explored and lived her days like this.

* * *

One day, when the girl was exploring, she discovered a small pad of paper and a handful of worn and faded color pencils.

They had been lying neatly on top of each other as if waiting for their owner to return and use them again; even as they became coated in ashen dust, they waited.

She, naturally, didn't know what these pencils were for and so decided to experiment.

She picked up the one with the least amount of grit on it, blew the inch thick dust off of it, and scratched a clumsy line against the pristine paper.

She could only stare in wonder at the deep golden line, wondering what had happened to the paper to make it such a beautifully yellow color.

The girl quickly decides to test the other pencils, smiling with childlike delight as each one proved to give different colors, each brighter than the last.

As she was transfixed by this simple phenomenon, she didn't hear the approaching footsteps coming into the room.

"Superior, this Castle would be perfect as a second- Who in the worlds are you?" An unfamiliar voice proclaims, shocking the girl out of her enchanted reverie.

She whips around to see two men in long dark jackets staring in bewilderment at her and her instinctive reaction is to run.

"HEY! COME BACK HERE!" The bossy older one shouts as the girl quickly scoops up the pencils and paper and rushes past him, very nearly knocking the elderly blonde man over in her hurry.

The other one, covered up in a dark hood, attempts to grab her as she runs past but misses his target when she spins around to avoid him.

She quickly loses them when she runs into a room and shuts the door behind her, screwing her eyes shut and holding the pad of paper to her chest.

"She's… she's gone!" The older man's voice proclaims in disbelief as the footsteps walk past the door.

"Indeed… but what was a girl doing here in the first place? This castle is supposed to abandoned, at least according to your report, Vexen." An icy voice says, sounding as if he was accusing his companion of failing him.

"Superior, I gave you all the information I had on this Castle! It is not my fault that the younger members are proving so difficult on their recon… just the other day, that fool of a Nobody, Roxas, only made it all too clear that the neophytes need more discipline." Vexen reports, sounding just as emotionless as his colleague.

"Find her. And if you fail me again, Number IV, I will not hesitate to turn you into a Dusk. Do I make myself clear?" The Superior says as Vexen splutters in confusion, beginning to list reasons why he should reconsider that rash declaration.

The rambling of the older man fades off as they apparently continue to walk down the hallway, looking for the girl that had so suddenly appeared in the supposedly abandoned castle.

The girl trembles violently at her sudden fright and slides down into a sitting position at the foot of the door, hoping against hope that the men would simply walk by and not come back.

She does not move from this position for hours, too afraid even to move.

It was only when she noticed that she had brought the pencils with her that she begins to draw, the somewhat crude forms of a peaceful island emerging from her trembling fingertips.

* * *

Days after she had met the strange men in the black cloaks, the girl finally decided that it was safe enough to go back outside.

So when that morning's grayish light passes through the cracked window of the room she had chosen for sleeping, the girl was ready to go outside.

She pulls on her simple sandals and straightens the strap of her dress, making sure that the pristine whiteness of the dress was not sullied by the constant dust of the old Castle.

She finds the leftovers of her meal the day before and quickly drinks the bottle of green liquid labeled "Elixir" that she hadn't finished last night.

"Good morning." She murmurs to the castle, fixing her messy hair by quickly running her hands down the sides of her head.

Walking briskly, she quickly navigates the hallways and makes it outside to the dank grayness of the gates.

She begins her daily ritual by running the length of the path until she made it to a small cliff.

Like she did every morning, the girl kicks off a gray pebble into the abyss below, wondering whether it would fall forever in the way that she thought it did.

The girl sucks in a deep breath and calls out to the darkness:

"Hello! Is someone there? Hello, it's me! Do you remember?"

She expects no returning answer, after all, so far no one had answered her questions no matter how long she asks.

However, this day was different.

"Hello, miss." A deep voice says in a questioning tone, wondering, curious.

The girl turns around and, in her panic, stumbles over a half hidden cobblestone, falling backwards at the sudden voice in the darkness.

"Tell me, child. Why are you here alone?" The man questions, removing a hood from his head as he shakes his silvery hair out of his gleaming golden eyes.

The girl trembles at the sound of the man's voice; he sounded so familiar… so menacingly familiar…

She knew that he was probably "Superior," the one that "Vexen" had speaking to but that wasn't why she was afraid.

His voice itself was giving her the chills and fear began to spread through her mind, clouding it, as the man looks at her in that curious way.

"I… I live here." The girl lies, instinctively shaking uncontrollably as the man begins to walk towards her.

He chuckles, arching an eyebrow as he observes the girl in front of him and he swoops down to pick up a fallen brick from the hardened earth.

He starts bouncing it idly in his palm and now his ominous eyes turn to face her own frightened blue ones.

"I was under the impression that this Castle was abandoned. My… associates have informed me that it has not been lived in for about ten years." The man says, flicking his brick at the girl's feet, very narrowly missing her left sandal and sending up a spray of hardened grit up the girl's legs.

She trembles even harder and gulps as the man holds his gloved hand out to her. It seemed that he wanted it her to take it.

"I… I just moved in. I live here now." The girl insists, feeling that prickling sensation in her eyes as her chest seems to contort into a tight knot as the man stares at her with that faint smile on his lips.

"Really." He says simply, making it clear from that one word that he did not believe her. The girl shudders and hides her eyes when the man grips her wrist firmly and drags her to her feet.

He grabs her chin, not forcibly but firmly, and makes her look into those menacing golden eyes.

"Tell me the truth." He states in an unemotional voice, squeezing her slender wrist tightly until she cried out in pain.

Slowly as the man continues to hurt her, the girl stammers out her story and makes sure not to lie this time.

She explains that she had fallen through a tunnel and had found herself in the castle all alone and that she had no idea who she was.

She explains about the Heartless and how she had helped it find a memory to bring it back to its true form.

She even continues to babble on about how she was looking for something in the Castle and how she had been let inside by her mysterious benefactor.

When she had finished, the man let go of her and allowed her to tumble clumsily to the hard cobblestone path that led up to the Castle.

She whimpers in pain as she clutches her throbbing arm to her chest, her sight blurring with the unshed tears welling up in her eyes.

"So you _are _a Nobody. You are the fourteenth one that we have found…. But I believe we could have _some _use for you." The man says with a sinisterly cold smile as he grabs her wrist one more time and drags her to her feet yet again.

She whimpers as the man holds his hand out to the darkness in front of him as he was calling out to someone unseen behind her.

For a moment, she thought he was going to hurt her again but instead, she sees that the huge doors of the Castle had opened up, allowing her a view of the stark white walls inside.

He looks at her then, his emotionless eyes questioning and wondering.

She began to feel completely insignificant when he looked at her in that calculating way, as if she was only a tool that he could use to get what he wanted.

"What was your Other's name?" He questions quickly, sounding as if he didn't really care but required the information anyway.

The girl could only shake her head furiously; she had no idea.

Even when he commands her to tell him, she could only shake her head and allow her tears to flow down her pale cheeks.

Finally, the man had come to a logical conclusion.

"Can you remember anything from your Other's life?" He demands, shaking her violently when she shakes her head.

"No!" She whimpers when the man shakes his head in mock disgust.

"So you are another one with no memories. Very well. I believe I know whose Nobody you are. Your name shall be Naminé… after the Princess who you once belonged to." The man states as a swirl of golden letters dance around her head, shining intensely in the darkness of the quickly falling night.

"Naminé" stares at the light even as her captor begins to push her towards the vortex.

"Where are we going?" she asks, feeling a little braver since she had been named now.

The man chuckles and points towards the black swirl.

"We are going to a special place, Naminé. A place where you can finally serve a purpose and where you need not hide your skills any longer." The man says in a soft, almost enticing voice as he very gently puts his hand on Naminé's shoulder.

Naminé felt confused; he was acting very differently from how he had been acting before. Now he seemed almost… friendly.

He makes a soft laughing noise as she smiles at him.

"Okay… but what's your name?" She asks curiously, feeling somewhat safe for the first time since she had awakened.

This man knew what she was. He had acted oddly before but he could help her find what she was looking for. … Or at least, she hoped he would.

"Xemnas, Naminé. My name is Xemnas." Xemnas states in a soothingly gentle voice as he holds out his hand to her again.

This time, the childlike and innocent Nobody takes his hand, and not knowing any better, she allows him to walk her into Castle Oblivion.


	2. The Replication: Xion

**Why the hell are these fun to do?**

**You might have noticed, people who read this fic, that it's not on my schedule and there's a good reason for that.**

**I work on this one whenever I want since it's like my boredom story... and considering that there's three more possible chapters currently in production that's good news for you!**

**Anyway, here's your disclaimer: Kingdom Hearts is not mine, and so therefore Xion is not my creation and does not belong to me in any shape, way or form.**

**I just happen to be a fan. Cause she's that awesome.**

**Yes, I know that she's not a Nobody. She is in fact, a Replica… though that technically is a special brand of artificial Nobody.**

**But dammit, she's an Organization member (kinda?) and therefore she counts (I guess?)!**

**As usual, I've taken a few liberties to make it a bit better. It's kinda my job as a fan-fiction writer.**

* * *

_I've always wondered about the first week that I was in the Organization._

_I could barely remember it, the first hazy week of my existence._

_But sometimes I think that I remember the moment in which I was awakened from my creation._

_Even now, I wonder if it was all a dream… but then again, the dream of a Replica isn't worth much, is it?_

_My past memories, or at least the few ones that I remember, are nothing but the memory of someone else._

_I wonder constantly:_

_Who am I? What am I even here for?_

_Am I not supposed to have ever existed?_

_I've asked why they created me. _

_There was no purpose: they easily could have made someone else. But instead, I was made._

_Why?_

_These "feelings" of loneliness and betrayal… why would they make me if only to feel that? _

_I feel horrible about that. About hurting my friends._

_The first time I met them, I never would have thought that they would become so important to me._

_All they were then were two more numbers, two more faces in a room of thirteen._

* * *

The experiment was succeeding successfully.

Each one of the various tanks had a single specimen of the Replication Project, each person inside representing a valuable sample of the combined use of a somewhat crude use of sorcery and a more refined technology.

Once the size of a mere dot, they had quickly matured into various stages growth that ranged from a mere infant to a full grown adult.

Until they quickly began to fail and die.

One by one, they were discarded, rendered completely useless until there were only one of the original batch left.

The specimen was a raven haired girl who was significantly less advanced in her growth than the others had been; she looked almost exactly like the most innocent of children and looked like she was no older than fourteen years old.

She was immobile in her floating prison; she had a calm expression as she slept, dreaming of another place and another time.

The girl would occasionally twitch, the memory of movement coursing through her frail limbs as she simulated her dreams with these sporadic motions.

* * *

Opening her expressionless eyes, she saw nothing.

Nothing but a strange whiteness.

She couldn't move and she couldn't breathe. At least not on her own.

Her small hands were strapped tightly to the sides of the tank and the bottom portion of her face was covered in a plastic mask which let in oxygen and took away carbon dioxide in a series of complex tubing built into the sides of the tank.

The girl didn't understand where she was nor who she was.

She was like the simplest child without the single conception of right or wrong, normal and abnormal.

She simply accepted her environment as ordinary and fell back into a dream stricken sleep.

She dreamt of the heat of the sun, the delicious coldness of water splashing against her skin, the smell of salt in the air as she ran, ran, ran.

She dreamt of an intense joy that she had never felt before in the short span of her life.

She dreamt of playing in a far off island and her slender limbs mimicked the motions that she did in her sleep as she continued to grew alone in that isolated tank.

She dreamt of being someone else, of being another person, someone far, far away.

* * *

One day, she began to hear.

The first thing that the girl heard was an icy voice speaking to her as if it thought she could actually understand.

It was a male voice, a little high pitched but needlessly excited as the older man tapped at the tank.

"Fascinating… You have grown well, No. I. Soon you will be ready to emerge, dear girl." Then the old man began to laugh in a strange way, sending the sleeping girl twitching at the slightly unsettling noise.

"It's female?" An equally as icy voice asks curiously as a sudden thudding noise echoes throughout the tank as the man taps the glass.

She winces, not liking the sensation.

"Yes, well, Saïx, she is. Due to the instability of Roxas's fragmented memories, I had to use the most prominent memory that he had. It so happened to be the memory of the Seventh Princess of Heart. But rest assured; No. I. is in fact a successful Replication of our little Keyblade Wielder." The first voice says in a calm voice as the girl finally opens her eyes.

She observes the two men in vague curiosity; they themselves didn't notice that they were being watched since they had their backs to her and were too engrossed into their own conversation.

"I didn't know that the Superior had asked for… this… _thing_, Vexen." Saïx says as his companion looks at him with a furious grimace.

The older man sweeps back his strangely long blonde hair from his shoulder and laughs mockingly.

"Such a pity to be so ignorant. As you're only able to see the surface of things, I should not expect you to appreciate No. I's true strength." Vexen comments, an arrogantly icy smile on his face.

Saïx scoffs and turns back to look at the Replica but she had already began to fall back into her deep sleep.

* * *

As the girl slept, she began to dream strange things.

She dreamed that she was someone else and that this person was waiting for someone.

As the girl waited impatiently in her dream, she would practice sword fighting by herself by sparring a peculiar tree with a crude wooden sword.

Occasionally, she would knock off one of the small star-shaped fruits of the tree, sending it flying with a loud splash into the water.

She always felt a bit proud when this would happen; she felt just a bit stronger each time it would happen.

Finally, she had grown tired and she sat in the crook of the tree, sitting quietly and staring at the glittering waters and at the setting sun with a peaceful feeling in her heart.

"Have you been waiting here _aaaall _day?" A friendly voice demands teasingly and the girl turns, a sudden excited expression spreading across her face as she spots someone.

She wasn't really sure who the person was but the girl knew that she was a friend.

The red haired girl standing there on the bridge looks vaguely impressed at the girl's feat of patience and walks over to her, taking a seat right next to her on the tree's trunk.

"Wow, you must have been really bored without anyone to keep you company! "The girl laughs with a pleasant smile on her delicate features.

The other girl frowns at this; why had the names that had come to mind suddenly gone fuzzy when she tried to remember? She didn't understand…

"Oh, I brought you something! Here; this is a Thalassa shell. My dad said that they're used to make lucky charms for sailors. It's supposed to bring them home safely. So… I wanted you to have it." The red haired girl hands over a small shape which the dreaming girl takes.

She stares at it in wonder; marveling at how neat the pink and yellow shell's lines and curves were made.

She holds it up to the orange-red sunlight of the setting sun and stares at it with a strangely sad feeling in her chest but she still manages to smile faintly.

The other girl notices this and grins.

"You _do _like it! I thought… you know, cause he said it would be kind of a dumb gift cause we live where…and that you wouldn't… But you do! And that's great." the friendly girl stammers out with a relieved and slightly shy smile.

The two girls remain silent for a few moments; the quiet was only combated when the dreamer scoops up a few pebbles and starts flicking them expertly into the water.

"You're so weird sometimes!" The other girl laughs and the dreamer smiles at the girl, feeling completely safe and calm in her friend's cheerful presence.

* * *

The girl kept dreaming such dreams as she continued playing alone on the small island of her ever fading memories.

Occasionally, there would be someone else with her, but these phantom friends would disappear as quickly they would appear.

The red haired girl that had given her the Thalassa shell vanished as well but every so often, the dreamer would remember the gift and wonder where she had gone.

Soon, all the happy moments of play blended into one long vague memory.

She would have happily spent the rest of her life in these dreams, blissfully ignorant of the fact that they were all false memories.

* * *

"No. I?" A voice asks, shocking the sleeping girl out of her dream of building a sand castle abruptly.

The person speaking shakes her violently, even going as far as to slap her in order to try to force her awake.

The girl didn't understand the sudden pain, only knowing that she didn't like the harsh contact.

"You must remain awake! Awaken, you useless child!" The man shouts, his earsplitting voice making the girl wince in pain as the harsh noise enters her pounding head.

She finally opens her eyes, staring up at the white ceiling and wondering why the sky had suddenly turned such a stark white color.

She blinks and continues to lie weakly in the bed, her expression continuing to be a blank one as she wonders vaguely where she was.

Her head was throbbing with the echoes of phantom pain as the man sitting next to her on a chair forces her to sit up.

He quickly gives her a bundle of clothes and instructs the dazed girl how to dress herself.

The simple clothing was easy enough to put on, even if Vexen had to correct her a few times when she attempted to put her black dress on backwards or when she slipped her hands into her socks like they were gloves.

As she dresses, the soft sensation of the clothes' material brushing against her skin feels somewhat familiar and very soothing.

This simple thought makes her smile vaguely at them even though she wasn't sure why.

"Are you done yet, No. I? I must take you to the Superior soon… he wants to see your progress. No, put that down!" Vexen snaps as the girl wanders over to a small table and stares blankly at a small Petri dish.

The greenish goop inside seemed familiar to her and she was about to pick it up to take a better look at its contents when Vexen grabs her wrist in a firm grip and yanks her away from the table.

"No! Don't touch it, No. I! Honestly… I'm a scientist, not a baby sitter. If it wasn't for the Superior's orders, I would not bother with such coddling! You are nothing more than a tool… a childlike tool at that." He mumbles to himself, his greenish eyes staring at the young girl before him as if she was an interesting puzzle that he longed to take apart.

No. I stares at him blankly, her vacant blue eyes showing that she didn't understand a word that the elderly man had just said.

He rolls his eyes impatiently and drags her over to a small cot, making a sign for her to sit down on it.

She does and he immediately starts moving towards the door.

"Stay here, No. I. If you move, I shall have to punish- Stop that!" Vexen snarls icily; No. I immediately stops fidgeting and folds her hands neatly in her lap.

He smiles at this and chuckles in a rather cold way as No. I waits patiently for him to continue speaking.

Somewhere in the dark recesses of her still developing mind, she dimly realizes that Vexen (as she assumed that he was called from her earlier encounter) was a person of authority.

She instinctively knew that it was in her benefit to probably obey his commands.

Even if she had no idea what he was trying to tell her.

"Now. I shall be bringing someone here to meet you, No. I. Do try to behave." He says in that continuously aloof voice, his icy green eyes sparkling with some admiration as No. I bows respectfully to him and nods robotically.

He quickly leaves, smiling to himself as he finally gets a semblance of the respect that he believed that he deserved.

* * *

No. I waits quietly for her creator to come back, barely even breathing as she follows his order practically to the letter.

As she sits there, she looks around the room cautiously without even moving her head, using only her eyes to observe her surroundings.

It was some sort of laboratory and the things that she could see attested to that fact.

Even with the limited breathing she allowed herself, No. I wrinkles her nose form the stench of foul smelling chemicals and a few unnamed substances that she didn't think she could identify any further except that perhaps they had once been alive at one point.

There was a continuous bubbling noise as flasks and vials that were being heated reached their boiling point and continued to heat up.

The otherwise white walls were covered in black scorch marks from recent explosions; there were even faint dents where something had shot out of its container and smacked into the walls, floor and ceiling.

The girl observes this quietly and continues to wait.

* * *

"Extraordinary." An arctic-like voice murmurs in appreciation as No. I turns to look at Vexen and an unknown man walk into the lab.

Vexen's green eyes gleam with an icy excitement when he sees that she hadn't moved from her place on the bed and he turns triumphantly to his companion.

"Yes, Superior, thank you. As I've mentioned before… This child is No. I, the first successful creation of the Replication project, Lord Xemnas." Vexen says with a broad smile as he points at No. I. who stares at him blankly.

She dimly realizes that the words "Replication project" must be important but she didn't understand what they had to do with her nor why Vexen looked so proud as the gray haired man observed her calmly.

He walks around the bed, looking at every nook and cranny of her visible body and nodding solemnly.

No. I shifts slightly under that piercing glare, feeling a sudden strange prickling sensation on her flesh. She begins to tremble ever so slightly under the man's strange eyes. She forces herself to remain sitting in that same perfect posture even as the man chuckles darkly.

"A perfect Replication. I expected nothing less from you, Number IV." Xemnas says as he waves an idle hand over No. I's head.

In an instant, the three letters of the girl's name appear above her, joined by a single 'X' and begin to spin in a dizzying dance.

Transfixed by the sudden appearance of the golden letters, she watches as the light of these characters spins around her splash rainbow tints everywhere as they spell out a brand new word:

_X. _

_I. _

_O. _

_N._

"Xion. Number XIV." Xemnas announces, naming the girl once and for all.

"Xion" looks blankly at him and wonders why Vexen's expression had suddenly changed into one of frosty surprise.

She didn't understand this new development and she didn't understand the significance of the black cloak that Xemnas had draped around her shoulders.

"Have her ready to come to the Round Room, number IV. I think she should be ready in about a hour." He says in that same monotone voice, now laced with a tinge of mysterious excitement.

He claps Xion encouragingly on the back and vanishes into a black vortex, leaving Xion and the startled Vexen.

He turns to her and smiles icily at her, patting her gently on the head as if she were some sort of animal that needed some attention.

She glares indifferently at him, feeling the empty oddness inside of her shift slightly as he helps her into the long hooded cloak.

"Well done, child! I knew that-" Vexen gasps in vacant horror, grabbing the sides of Xion's head as he looks fixedly at her changed features.

She blinks as she feels the sudden lightness of her hair and she puts up a hand to touch the stiff spikes.

"The… Keyblade Master? H-How?" Vexen stammers in confusion as Xion looks at her reflection in Vexen's icy green eyes.

The image of a young boy looks back at her with a soft smile and she smiles back at him, wondering just why he looked so familiar.

She couldn't remember just where she had seen that face but it was like she had seen it every single day of her life.

"Don't you dare take this hood off, Xion! Do you understand?" Vexen orders with a shaky voice as he snatches her hood and drapes it over her head.

Suddenly half-blinded by the dark fabric, Xion winces at him and tries to shake it loose but Vexen reinforces the subconscious idea that she shouldn't remove it.

She nods solemnly as he orders her again and again until the lesson was engraved firmly in her mind.

* * *

Xion is soon brought into a strange room and she waits patiently as the black cloaked individuals begin to appear in a flash of black haze on the various chair.

They all look a bit bored and more than a few look a bit confused at this sudden summoning; these look pointedly at Xemnas who was smiling icily down at where Xion was hiding behind the thrones.

One in particular looks completely blank and this boy stared into space blankly as if he didn't understand what was going on. The red-haired man who fixes him into place on his throne looks mildly bored as well.

For some reason, Xion couldn't help but gaze at this boy even as Vexen signals her to walk forward with a carefully aimed and unbelievably disdainful smile.

She stares in mild wonder at the white throne-like seats which were arranged in a small circle around the room as Xemnas begins to speak.

"Good tidings, friends. Today is a momentous day. I am pleased to announce that a new comrade has been chosen to wear the cloak." He says in a calm yet proud voice as Xion walks forwards, unabashedly looking up at the startled Organization members with an impassive curiosity.

The blonde boy that had sparked Xion's interest before suddenly stares at her in confusion, blinking his dark blue eyes rapidly as if he had remembered something unexpectedly and was trying desperately to hold onto the vague memory.

"Number XIV. Let us all welcome one of the Keyblade's chosen." Xemnas continues with that same indifferently proud smile as Xion stares fixedly at number XIII, a boy whose name she would only later discover to be Roxas.

She stares up at the strange boy who seemed so much like her and he stares back with that same emotionless curiosity.

All she could hear in the silence of the Round Room was the sound of waves curling away from some distant faraway shore, ever so gentle, in the distance.

And she smiled just as gently at this solemn boy, feeling a strange connection to the boy who would one day become one of her most precious friends in all of the worlds.


End file.
